Verisimilitude
by artypendragon
Summary: Merlin looks at you, and there's guilt in his eyes. (Lancelot/Merlin, seemingly unrequited Arthur/Merlin)


Merlin looks at you, and there's guilt in his eyes.

You're trying to assuage him, stroking his hair and his cheek and his shoulder, sliding your hand all the way down to his knuckles, reminding him that you want this, that you walked into this with your eyes open. He shudders the moment you join palms with him and interlock your fingers; perhaps from a memory of an intimate touch with someone else, or maybe this is simply something he hadn't expected (from you).

"You look lovely," you say, sincerity coating every syllable of your words, and you hope he understands.

He swallows. Looks away from you. You track the way his chest rises and falls under your own, rosy with embarrassment. He clutches the edges of his tunic, fists resting against his waist as a sliver of pale stomach cuts across the deep blue of the blanket. He won't say anything. You want him to sing.

So you lean down and kiss him for the first time. A brief brush of your mouth against his, a question. Merlin hiccoughs in a sob and it jolts you backwards. You stare wide-eyed at him as he sits up, and begin to lift your weight off his thighs when he hooks his fingers into the flesh at your shoulder blades and drags you to him. Your head knocks against his and you want to chuckle at the clumsiness he hasn't got rid of in the five years you've known him, but then he fixes you with a fierce look.

"It's not you," he mutters, and you have to struggle to fish his words out from amidst the pitter-patter of the raindrops, rapping like hail against the glass windows of your narrow barracks room.

"I know," you say. Merlin nuzzles your face, then, in something like gratitude, but that's not what you want him to be feeling; this isn't some magnanimous, selfless act you decided to perform, so you try and kiss him again, resettling on his lap with your knees on either side of his hips.

You know you're beautiful. You're aware of the way everyone looks at you, like you're the sole sunbeam piercing through a storm cloud (you'll never be the sun). You've heard your fellow knights talk about you with lust and envy and admiration, you've heard chambermaids and squires exhaling wistful breaths in your direction as you walk past. Even Guinevere, who looks straight through to your heart, has giggled over your perfect thin mouth and gracile physique. Not even the _king_ can resist taking a second glance at you when you enter a room, but you're sure it's because he's searching for whatever Merlin sees in you that always makes him smile so widely.

You know you're beautiful, but Merlin's _extraordinary._

There's something to be said for Merlin, really, the way he's so unknowing of the portrait he paints. Merlin with just his scruffy, uncombed hair and sleepy, pouting lips can bowl you over, make you breathless for something you never even knew you wanted. The way he rolls his eyes at a rude comment from his master, the way he fiddles with his scarf when he's bored of standing next to the throne, the way he purposely makes a racket serving dinner sometimes just to distract the king from one of his moods—you want them. You want all of him. Not to possess, because he's not yours, will never be yours, but to be able to say _he trusted me with himself_ and _I will never let him down_.

So that you have your chance now, so that his heart is so desperately broken that he approached you is an honour—he's trusted you with himself. You will never disappoint him. You will try to heal him, even though your hands are trained to rend, not repair.

He kisses you back the second time you try, supporting himself with his arms, pillars behind him on the rough plank of your mattress. You cradle his face in your palms. He hasn't spoken much since he woke you up in the early morning, propped up against the door jamb with his coat drenched from the downpour outside, but he forces meagre words of explanation from his throat somehow—

"He, erm, he, doesn't love—found out about my m—Lancelot, Lance, please—"

You kiss him again.

Merlin puckers his lips and kisses back innocently, and you shiver when you see him close his eyes, lashes—feathery dark, much thicker than yours—fanning out on either side of his bridge. You sigh and capture his bottom lip between both of yours, sucking lightly, licking it wet. He returns the favour when he softly bites your mouth. He seems to be in no hurry, even though the day will begin soon and he'll have to go face the reason he's in your bed.

You slide closer to him, heavy against his groin. He gasps, but his eyes remain closed. His arms buckle and he's resting on his elbows and then on his back and then you're covering every inch of him with every inch of you, hoping your heat brands him, kissing all over his face because you love him but not the way you want to.

He's your friend (you kiss his eyelids). He was the first person in your life who took you in and tried to give you your dream on a silver platter (he opens his mouth in want and you delve in, the points of his teeth hard against your tongue). He got drunk with you when he barely knew you, and he pleaded your case against the tyrant king (his fingers curl into your hair and pull). He called you friend, he listened to you, he wept for you, he rejoiced for you (you grind down on him and he sighs in something finally close to pleasure), he trusted his best friend with you and he trusted his magic with you (his tongue hesitantly brushes against yours and it's not that he's inexperienced but you're sure he's never done it with someone he cares for).

"Merlin," you groan, pulling away from the addiction of his mouth. Merlin looks at you, pupils dilated, mouth red from all your kisses and gleaming from his spit and yours.

"You want this?" you ask. Merlin slides a leg out from under you and hooks it around your thigh, making you rub against him again. You shiver and force yourself up so you're on all fours, staring down at him.

" _You_ want this?" he replies.

Not even a blind man could miss his anguish—his heart's blown wide open and you wish you knew exactly what the king did to him, but Merlin will never say a word against the man he says he was made for, so the only thing that occurs to you to do is suck a purple mark into the hollow at the base of his neck, something he could choose to hide or reveal as he pleased. He fidgets as you mark him, and you can gratifyingly hear the mewling he's trying to push back into his throat.

Merlin seems irritated, now, at the excruciatingly slow pace at which you're taking this (though you would call it _tender_ if you were allowed) and pulls at your nightshirt hastily—you laugh breathily and widen your eyes at him.

He smiles for the first time and with a flash of golden eyes you're both naked. He seems reluctant to raise his head and look at you the way he clearly wants to, so you take that decision out of his hands and bury your fingers in his hair, pulling him up as you sit back on your heels.

"Watch," you whisper, and you take both your cocks in one hand. He cries out at that, jerking up and clutching the bedsheet in his fists. You're still not speeding up. You want it to last, now. Merlin came to you when he did even though he knew the consequences. You'll keep him here in your bed until the king himself comes to find him.

Lord, Merlin is gorgeous. Every bit of him. His hair, his face, his spare body. His long, pink cock, fat in your fist, straining and leaking against your own. You're pumping slowly, wishing you had more of the salve you used up last night.

"Please," Merlin mumbles.

You give in.

You crawl backward until you can feel his feet against your arse, and then you get on all fours again and take him in your mouth.

Gwaine's going to be an utter bastard about all this later on, you realise, because Merlin now is begging and moaning loud enough to be heard all across the barracks, through the thundering rain, through the bustle of the first few knights outside the door enthusiastic enough to want to train in this weather.

He feels lovely in your mouth. Soft and hard and hot and salty. You lavish him with your adoration, letting your spit drip out of your mouth onto him, sucking when you get to the tip and holding Merlin down with one arm. You force him into your mouth until you're choking, you'd never sucked cock before this, for Merlin you would do anything, _anything_.

He's watching you, unable to move, but he's watching you and watching you and then he can't watch anymore. Three more minutes of your worship later, he comes in your mouth (you swallow, of course you do) and the only warning he gives is

" _Arthur_."

You'd hoped it would hurt you to listen for and get that name. You'd prayed, so that later you could bundle Merlin into your arms and pull apart even a bit of the void gaping in Merlin. But all you feel is sorry for your friend, Arthur's name somehow salvation for whatever sin you've just committed.

Innocent Merlin takes ages to come down from his high, and by that time you've finished with the thought of someone else in your mind. He sleepily reaches for you and you go, the two of you curling around each other like childhood friends. He smells of you, and you're savouring the taste of his nipple in your mouth (he's mewling again, trying to pull your head closer) when the door opens to admit your king, drenched like Merlin had been.

"I heard he was here," Arthur says hoarsely before he realises what he's seeing.

Merlin buries his face in the crook of his arm. You can feel him beginning to crumple in grief and shame, so you do a bit of magic yourself and pull the covers out from under both of you to cover him.

Arthur looks ashen, contrite, _jealous_ as he gazes at Merlin's black head. You stare at him until he swallows and lowers his gaze, and a second later quietly shuts the door behind him.

"You okay?" you murmur into Merlin's ear.

Merlin nods, lying.

So you let him fall asleep wrapped in your deep blue blanket as the rain clears up, and go to your king to train your hands to rend better.


End file.
